In order to understand the reason why poet Basho was trying to recapture the old during his journey to the north in his poetic diary "A Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches", one has to look at his background first to understand why he decided to leave his life behind and to make such dangerous trip.
             Basho lived in a small wooden hut near Edo; which is present day Tokyo. He planed a banana tree in front of his yard. Thus gives his house a famous name the Basho Hut. He had a quiet but rich life during this time. He had many friends, disciples, and patrons; He wrote many haiku form poems and had many students who visited him every day. (pg 25) But all these changed after a couple of events occurred during this period. First, that was a fire which destroyed his famous Basho Hut thus makes him homeless, (pg 27) and probably the idea that man is eternally homeless began haunting his mind more and more frequently. A few months later he received news from his family home that his mother had died. (pg 29) Since his father had died already, he was now not only without a home but without a parent to return to. Although he rebuilt his Basho Hut later, it was not enough to sweep away with his melancholy and emptiness. He was already a wanderer in spirit, and he had to follow that impulse in actual life.
             So Basho sets out on his journey for the sake of spiritual and poetic discipline. Through the journey he wanted, among other things, to face death and thereby to help temper his mind and his poetry. So one should easy understand why Basho feels as sad upon his departure as he mentioned in his diary: "
             Basho is prepared to perish alone and leave his corpse to the mercies of the wilderness if that is his destiny.
             During his short stop at town Rapid's Head, he stopped at warrior Sato's house. He later cried at temple. He says in his diary: "I wept bitterly in front of the tombstones of the ...